Bipolar Expeditions (2 page)

In my own work and employment, facing the stigma of mental illness has been an ongoing problem. When, as part of fieldwork, I had been trained to lead support groups for people with manic depression, the organization that provided the training strongly encouraged us trainees to start a support group in our own local town or workplace. I was a professor at Princeton at the time and I knew that several of my students were struggling with bipolar disorder.
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I went to the psychiatrist who was head of the student counseling service and explained what I had been trained to do, offering to facilitate the formation of a group in some small way. She thanked me but explained that students at Princeton did not need such a group. She said that students with those kinds of serious mental problems would simply not be able to function in the intellectually demanding environment at Princeton, so there was no need to form a group. In this social setting, if you say you have manic depression, you may well be categorized as a nonfunctional person, as a less than a fully rational person. I did not tell her that I, too, had the diagnosis because at the time this admission felt too terrible to bring to light. Would I, too, be judged incapable of functioning at Princeton?

Among you who have read this far, or among your nearest and dearest, may be a person who is living under the description of one of the psychological conditions I discuss in this book. Some of you may also be taking psychotropic drugs or undergoing psychotherapy. I want to acknowledge the pain and suffering that can be attendant upon these conditions, as well as the real amelioration that drugs and other therapies can offer, but I also want to understand these conditions in a broader cultural and historical context in order to shed light on the experience of having manic depression. In my life, as in this book, I stand in a doubled position as a person who appreciates the benefits of psychopharmacology and other therapies and who is curious about their historical and cultural significance. I invite readers to do the same.

When I have given lectures on the material in this book at public and private universities, large and small, members of the audience, students as well as faculty, have often felt moved to reveal their diagnosis of manic depression or some other mental disorder. Some have done this very publicly during audience discussions after the lecture, which always made me feel a mixture of delight and dismay: delight because the lecture had opened a space in which someone could make such a difficult admission; dismay because the person, carried away by the moment, might not realize the possible sanctions that could await her. At a seminar at the University of Washington, in front of some of the faculty on his committee, a graduate student revealed that he had been diagnosed with manic depression. Later, at dinner with a small group of faculty, I worried whether I should have forewarned my audience not to make such rash confessions. Susan Jeffords, professor and vice provost, suggested that the audience could have handled the confession better if they had done more than simply listen in anxious silence. When the student revealed his diagnosis of “bipolar disorder,” the others present could have acknowledged the vulnerability he had just created for himself and offered to become his local guardians. Until the stigma attached to mental illness eases, which is to say until our cultural understanding of it changes, the best alternative to secrecy and fear is this kind of collective responsibility.

Readers will not find in this book a handbook on how to live with manic depression, although they will find accounts of what it is like to live under the description of manic depression. Readers will not find here accusing fingers pointed at any single one of the experts or techniques that come to bear on our moods today—psychiatrists, patients, pharmaceutical companies, support groups, or drugs—although they will find a description of some disturbing aspects of the emerging landscape on which these and other forces have been interacting over many years to produce the thing we now know as bipolar disorder. There are groups who have mobilized to expose and discredit both psychiatry and the pharmaceutical industry: MadLib, the Alliance for Human Research Protection, and the Antipsychiatry Coalition, among others. Some individuals and groups have decided to opt out of the psychopharmacological world completely. In this ethnography I aim to explore the daily experiences of those who, for better or worse, are participating in the world that psychopharmacology has opened up.

Looking optimistically to the future, I would like to make use of the word “crazy,” because its dictionary meanings include: insane, full of cracks or flaws (desirable in certain kinds of pottery glaze), being out of the ordinary, distracted with desire or excitement, and passionately preoccupied. The word “gay” went from a shameful whisper to a proud shout, as homosexual identity became less stigmatized. I would hope that, somewhat differently, the word “crazy” could come to mark the ways that everyone belongs in one way or another—even if only in their dreams—to the realm of the irrational. I am not saying that we are all alike or that some of us are not disabled by our craziness. I am saying that there could be friendly recognition across the sometimes arbitrary line between rational and irrational acts and thoughts, not just in the corporate world but in all walks of life.

With this in mind, proceeds from the publication of this book will go toward support of the Live Crazy Network,
http://www.livecrazy.org
, a nonprofit organization that maintains an independent Web site for the writings of anyone who wishes to describe and analyze their experiences of the mind—a mind-opening endeavor.

Acknowledgments

 

 

Over the ten years of research and writing for this book, I have incurred many debts. I relied on the help of a number of able research assistants, who transcribed interviews, found obscure references, and tracked down endless details. For all this, I am most grateful to Anne Rose, Gabriella Drinovan, Ilka Datig, Rachel Dvorkin, Rachel Lears, Veronica Davidov, and Emily Cohen. Kelly Gillespie's efficient and confident help was a godsend in the process of gathering permissions and preparing illustrations.

In the spirit of collaboration, several people accompanied me on interviews or introduced me to people they knew. I could not have conducted these interviews unless they had vouched for my research. I thank Mimi Dumville, Allison Smith, and Julie Smith for their remarkable generosity in giving their time and their trust to the project.

I had the benefit of much intellectual stimulation from faculty and students at the two universities in which I worked during the last ten years, Princeton University and New York University. For helping me with the important details of bureaucratic life, I thank Carol Zanca, Eileen Bowman, and Jennie Tichenor. I feel fortunate to have many colleagues whose intellectual company was inspiring in the areas of my research and who sharpened my thinking during the course of many conversations over the years: Jim Boon, Joe Dumit, Troy Duster, Faye Ginsburg, David Harvey, David Healy, Elizabeth Lunbeck, Fred Myers, Gananath Obeyesekere, Mary Poovey, Bambi Schieffelin, Erica Schoenberger, Judy Stacey, Rayna Rapp, and Nikolas Rose. Some colleagues also read and commented on the manuscript in detail, in whole or part. For taking valuable time from their own pressing lives and helping me make the book far more cogent and accessible, I owe profound thanks to Richard Chisolm, Richard Cone, Susan Harding, Don Kulick, Liisa Malkki, Leith Mullings, Lorna Rhodes, Louis Sass, Amy Smiley, and Melissa Wright.

For taking on the book when she was editor at Princeton University Press, and giving her superbly talented editorial hand to the manuscript not once but twice since beginning a new career in anthropology, I am grateful to Mary Murrell. Her generous and committed work with the manuscript profoundly improved its coherence. In turn, Fred Appel freely gave me encouragement, as well as sound editorial advice, and played a crucial role in shaping the final version of the manuscript. He also ably shepherded the book through the stages of editing and production at the Press. I also want to thank Natalie Baan at the Press for her warm enthusiasm and her outstanding organizational skills. Jennifer Backer provided meticulous and timely copyediting, as well as encouragement, for which I am grateful.

Because of the sensitivity of being identified with mental illness, I am not able to name many of the people who gave me so much insight into their lives, who allowed me into their organizations and homes to discuss their experiences. I hope they know how much I honor them and their willingness to participate in this research. Knowing them has immeasurably enriched my life. I can thank by name some individuals who helped me conceptualize places I might locate the research and who also provided keys to important doors. Jay Folkes, Charles Gross, William Helfand, John Kallir, Paul McHugh, and Everett Siegel have my lasting gratitude for their remarkable generosity. I will remember Dana Caruso for her courage in sharing the powerful story of her life until its untimely end. The Web site
www.livecrazy.org
is dedicated to her and to carrying on her efforts to increase knowledge about bipolar disorder. Special thanks go to Jim Ferguson and Liisa Malkki, who allowed me to house-sit for them when they were away for several summers, thus giving me a local residence in Orange County and a lovely place to entertain people I met during fieldwork. I also owe special thanks to C. E. Chaffin for his inspiring poetry and many insightful conversations.

I gratefully acknowledge support from three Princeton Faculty Research grants, a Guggenheim Fellowship, a National Science Foundation grant, and a Spencer Foundation grant. I gained some specialized insight into the advertising industry through a visiting professorship from the Advertising Educational Foundation, which I greatly appreciate. Access to the collections of the History of Medicine Division of the National Library of Medicine was enabled by a summer position, for which I thank Elizabeth Fee.

To my family, who smiled with recognition when I became consumed with this latest project and always believed that something would emerge from it, even when I was not sure, go my deepest thanks. My husband, Richard, knew from the start and accepted with grace that this project would mean tolerating a good measure of emotional upheaval. For cooking delicious meals, finding humor in everyday life, and letting me in on the adventures of their different lives, I thank Richard, Ariel, Jenny, and Yohance. Each in a unique way provided me with inspiration and the belief that active engagement with different forms of injustice can lead to social change. The nonhuman members of my family also helped keep me steady: I thank Rubie (the parrot) for being exuberant but usually staying just this side of mania; I thank Celeste and Ebony (the cats) for being calm but never sliding over into depression.

To those friends who bolstered my confidence during this project, I owe more than my heart can express. Without them this book surely would never have seen the light of day: Meg and Richard Chisolm, Susan Harding, Liisa Malkki, Leith Mullings, Lorna Rhodes, Erica Schoenberger, and Amy Smiley. Joan Bielefeld was my inventive and tireless advocate, helping me find a path through thickets of the mind. Her emotional warmth, acute observations, knowledge of psychopharmaceuticals, and solid good sense saved me over and over.

I also greatly benefited from the responses of colleagues and audiences while I lectured during the years I was writing the manuscript. I acknowledge with appreciation all that I learned at Harvard University, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, the City University of New York, the University of Washington, the University of Texas, Colby College, the University of British Columbia, the National Library of Medicine (History of Medicine Division), the National University of Ireland, Maynooth, the University of Wisconsin, Denison College, the Centre for Advanced Studies, Berlin, L'École Normale Supérieure, the University of Michigan, the University of Bergen, and the London School of Economics.

Some chapters in this book contain revisions and expansions of previously published material: “The Rationality of Mania,” in
Doing Science + Culture,
edited by Roddey Reid and Sharon Traweek (New York: Routledge, 2000), 177–98; “Rationality, Feminism, and Mind,” in
Feminism in Twentieth-Century Science, Technology, and Medicine,
edited by Angela N. H. Creager, Elizabeth Lunbeck, and Londa Schiebinger (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2001), 214–29; “Moods and Representations of Social Inequality,” in
Gender, Race, Class and Health: Intersectional Approaches,
edited by Leith Mullings and Amy Shultz (San Francisco: Jossey Bass, 2005), 60–88; “Project Security,” in
Making Threats: Biofears and Environmental Anxieties,
edited by Betsy Hartmann, Banu Subramiam, and Charles Zerner (Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield, 2005), 187–97; and “Cultures of Mania: Towards an Anthropology of Mood,” in
The New Politics of Surveillance and Visibility,
edited by Kevin D. Haggerty and Richard V. Ericson (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2006), 327–39. Portions of C. E. Chaffin's poems, “Manic-depression” (published in the online journal
Interface)
and “My Testament” (published in the online journal
Poetry Superhighway)
are printed here with permission. A portion of Robert Penn Warren's poem, “Tell Me a Story,” is printed with permission, copyright © 1998 by the estate of Robert Penn Warren and reprinted by permission of the William Morris Agency, LLC, on behalf of the author.

More than any other project I have undertaken, my classes with undergraduate and graduate students have informed this book. In seminars at Princeton University and New York University, students subjected the basic texts that engaged me to collective scrutiny and, by arguing with me, gave my ideas greater purchase. The most important courses were Cultures of the Mental, the Anthropology of Personhood, Drugs, Politics and Culture, and the Anthropology of the Unconscious (taught jointly with Don Kulick). To my colleagues and former graduate students who, under the leadership of Karen-Sue Taussig, held a session for my sixtieth birthday at the 2005 American Anthropological Association meetings, I owe one of the happiest afternoons of my life and the courage to finish this book.